My dears, there is too much news to tell, none of it is all that much fun, and I’m trying to give up negative thinking for Lent. So let’s look at some pretty things, and I swear I’ll fill you in later on all the Murphy’s Law ridiculousness that’s been going on the last few weeks. Deal? Deal.

Needle Felted Clam Pincushion by IguanaMakeIt

This, my dears, is my most recent Christmas present. Yes, I know halfway through March is a bit late for Christmas presents. However, in this case, it’s a good thing. You see, this past Christmas, I got a regular treasure trove of presents from Lucy and The Auteur. Wine glasses, a movie I adore, a post-it note that’s still taped up on my closet wall, and then to top it all off, a gift card for Etsy.

It was an embarrassment of riches. And suddenly, although I have over 1000 items on my Etsy Favorites list, now that I could actually get something I was seized with indecision. Should I spend my lovely gift card on crafting supplies, like gorgeously colored 100% wool felt, or would a new purse be more useful? Maybe I should be practical, and get a cute project bag made from matryoshka print fabric, or waterproof fabric to sole the shoes I’m totally going to sew for myself any day now, or pretty washi tape to … I dunno, be pretty. On the other hand, maybe I should go for something frivolous and fun, the kind of thing that would make me smile every time I saw it, like swing dancing flamingos, or a silly print to hang on my wall, or a really cute egg cup. And then there were the Things of Beauty, like these delicate seed pearl earrings, or embroidered lace that makes me think of bright summer days, or a moonrise print that makes me think of Jacob. Or maybe I should just finally buy the St. Walter of Pontoise medal (patron of those with stressful jobs) that’s been sitting in my cart for, um, over a year. The more beautiful things I saw, the more I couldn’t decide. It was hard. But, you know, the good kind of hard.

Today I made up my mind. I clicked on a link, and instantly I knew that I had found just the right thing. You see, I have come to realize that I need a better pincushion to keep near my main sewing spot, the comfy chair by the window in my bedroom. It should be somewhat heavy, so I can perch it on the windowsill without worrying about it getting knocked off, it should have a way to keep the needles and pins separate so that pins won’t get all tangled up with excess thread, and it should be something that I will enjoy seeing every day. I had been mulling over ideas for making something, but was feeling a little discouraged about it, since given my current backlog of projects, I might get around to it sometime next year, as long as I didn’t make any Christmas presents. I never would have dreamt that the solution to my problem was needle felted mollusc. It adds another layer of ridiculous to the whole thing that really takes it to the next level. Just like that, my decision was made, and I had bought a pincushion for my windowsill.

Let the Rain Come necklace from Enchanted Leaves

I still had some of the gift card left , so I decided that since I had bought one thing that was equal parts whimsical and useful, I should spend the rest on something that would (and I can’t think of a way to say this that doesn’t sound like a cheesy self-help manual) comfort my spirit. It’s no secret that the last four months or so have been hard. The challenges, they keep a-coming, and it doesn’t look like they’re going to let up any time soon. When it rains, it pours.

So I decided to get an umbrella. Lately I’ve been learning again (still, always) how many people I have in my life who are ready to support, encourage, and care for me in every way. It’s so many people: Mom who worries about whether I have groceries in the house, the nurse coworker who administered my shot so I didn’t have to pay my doctor’s office to do it, AP and Boy-O giving me rides to work, The Duchess making me dinner even in the midst of moving, an aunt deciding that instead of sending her regular contribution to Catholic Charities, she’d rather help me pay my medical bills, my boss helping me run errands, Johnnycakes offering to carry my loaded laundry basket upstairs, and my sweet cousins giving me this opportunity to buy something beautiful and unnecessary. There have been so many kindnesses that I could not list them all, but I am so glad for every one.

The rains may be here, but I have an umbrella. Several of them, actually. Every time I wear this necklace, I will remember.

Today is Johnnycakes’ birthday, so I’m finding it extra appropriate/hilarious that today is also the feast of a St. John. Speaking of Johnnycakes, the big news around town is that he got officially engaged last weekend. His now-fiancee is an amazingly sweet young woman who fits him perfectly (and he fits her perfectly) in so many ways. Unfortunately, I still don’t have a nickname for her, which is awful. It’s not that I don’t know her well enough to come up with one, it’s just that nothing has felt quite right yet. I might have to ask her and Johnnycakes for suggestions.

I’m utterly delighted for both of them, and my delight has been amplified by relief. When I first heard the news, my second thoughts (after my first thoughts of “Yay!”) were something along the lines of “Oh, crap, now I have to get a roommate, except there aren’t very many people I really want to live with, and most of them are related to me, and I’m running out of single relatives who aren’t already happily settled in living situations. Or maybe could I afford the place on my own? Except the budget’s really tight as it is – maybe I can get a promotion? Or just get a second job? Or…” And that sort of thing tends to suck the joy out of something. Except then I found out that Johnnycakes and his Yet To Be Nicknamed Fiancee aren’t planning to get married until April 2015. And that’s a nice, long way away, long enough that maybe I really will be able to get that promotion, or find the perfect roommate, or whatever. So now I can just be happy for them without worrying.

And speaking of delightful things, last week was our annual Family Vacation, when everyone in my immediate family who can converges on one location and just hangs out with each other for a while. This year we headed off to southern Ohio again to stay at a retreat house. Last year this location turned out to be somewhat unfortunate. Only minutes after we arrived, a monster storm arrived that wiped out the power to a huge chunk of the eastern US, including where we were, for days. We had our vacation anyway, but it was a lot more rustic than we’d been counting on. This year the power stayed on the whole time we were there, and we were grateful!

Someone asked me what we do when we’re on vacation. And, well, we just sorta hang out. Watch movies. Do crafts. Go swimming a lot. Cook big meals. Spend time with each other. Remember that we’re a family. And this year we had the added entertainment of babies:

Nieces are a lot of fun to play with. They weren’t so much interested in playing with each other – another small person is mostly competition for resources, not a source of entertainment.

I got a few pictures of Sweet Pea “reading” a book to the Little Philospher, but even that didn’t last long. But it was really cute while it lasted.

However, they’re awfully fun for us to play with. Sweet Pea, almost a year and a half now, is walking all over the place, and starting to talk. She spent hours every morning trotting back and forth down the hallway between the kitchen and the small sitting room where people tended to congregate, stopping to converse earnestly and mostly unintelligibly with whoever she might encounter. She says hi, and bye bye, and please and thank you. She can say baby (which she thinks is her name), and greets her mother with the most ecstatic, “Hi, Mommy!” you ever saw. She’s also very pleased with learning to say Meow, and will serenade you with it at length at the drop of a hat. She demonstrated her skill during the Eucharistic prayer at Mass, causing an entire pew of her aunties and uncles to fizz with poorly suppressed giggles.

The Littlest Philosopher, who may be renamed the Baby Orca for her way of trying to dive backwards out of her feeding chair by violently arching her back, sortof like a baby whale breaching the waves, is about nine months old now, and starting to walk herself. She’s still figuring out this whole muscle control thing, so her walking is more like lurching, very comical for the watching aunt. She’s also still working on her smiles – there is no doubting her enthusiastic glee, but her smiles come out a little like the Comedy mask, which can be a bit disconcerting on such a small face.

But it’s still pretty stinking cute.

I had big plans for sewing a new Pavlova wrap sweater (desperately needed for my work wardrobe), and sewing and fitting the wearable muslin for my Hummingbird top. Neither of those projects got completed. I was steaming ahead on the Pavlova until I discovered that I’d cut out two Left ties instead of a Left and Right. That was so discouraging that I switched to the Hummingbird top, and got a lot done. I just didn’t, you know, finish.

It was fun sewing though. As people got up in the mornings, they tended to stumble into the kitchen for coffee and breakfast, and then congregate in the upstairs sitting room/game room, watching the news on tv, working on computers, playing games, or just hanging out. Indy had also brought along some sewing projects, and an enormous bag of craft supplies to do crafting lessons with Fleur. Fleur had heard about the Skype art lessons Indy has been doing with Honey, and was immediately shocked that any of her staunts (step-aunts) were showing attention to any nieces but her! So she asked for her own art lesson, and over vacation, Indy showed her how to sew together her own little stuffed felt cat, and an owl to live in its own Altoids tin house, inspired by this one. So most mornings we spent at least some time sitting around the big table in the game room, sewing. It made me feel like the ladies in a Jane Austen movie.

Now we’re all back to our regularly scheduled lives. Since there was such an outcry for proper pictures of my new work wardrobe, I’m working with Indy to schedule a proper photo shoot, or at least one that won’t make me look like an ogress. And then, I’ve been neglecting my garden shamefully while I’ve been so focused on sewing, so that needs to be sorted out. Plus, you know, the work wardrobe is far from finished. I had forgotten how cold the work AC gets, so I’ve been wearing my one work sweater every day this week. That’s getting a little old, so I’ve really got to get that Pavlova finished soon. Plus they’re showing The Princess Bride down at the Victoria this weekend as part of the Hot Times/Cool Films series, and that’s inconceivably cool.

When I was growing up, every year my Aunt B would have a Seder (the traditional Jewish ritual meal that kicks off the celebration of Passover). It was the most tremendously exciting thing. Everything, from the tablecloths on the tables, to the little dishes of salt water, and the special foods like charoset and matzoh, seemed extra special. Plus, that was the one time of year that we had lamb, so succulent in its garlicky goodness, every part delectable from the crunchy, slightly charred bits on the outside to the tender pink meat in the center. (Even today, if we really want to celebrate something in my family, we have lamb.) There were all of these prayers with Hebrew words in them, and if you were lucky (or very good at the subtle pre-dinner maneuvering) you got to light the candle at your table. Everyone got to drink wine with their dinner (though the younger kids weren’t all that interested and tended to go for the Kool-aid). And at the end of the night, after we’d prayed and prayed, and eaten, and prayed some more, and eaten more things, we ended with, “Next year in Jerusalem! Next year in the city of God!” It was pretty awesome.

This year I decided that I wanted to have a Seder of my own. It’s been a while since Aunt B has been well enough to do the whole production (and God knows it is a lot of work), and Johnnycake’s girlfriend (who still doesn’t have a satisfactory nickname) is getting received in the Church as the Easter Vigil this year, and I wanted to meet AnniPott’s beau, and, well, I just wanted to. So I made my guest list, and realized that there was no way I could fit thirty or forty people around my table (or afford lamb enough for all of them).

So first I was cranky about the inherently exclusive nature of dinner parties for a bit (and also mourned my lack of an independent income which would allow for such little luxuries as dinner service for 30, dinner tables and chairs to seat them, and a room large enough to keep the tables and chairs in a house large enough that we didn’t need to use the room for anything else. Also, servants and a cook to help provide the dinner. And then I quit daydreaming about living in Downton Abbey, and texted the first fifteen people on the list while assuaging my guilt at not inviting the others by swearing that I’d invite them to another dinner party, really I would, just, you know, later.

Once I’d gotten the obligatory Guilt part of the way, I proceeded to the fun part: planning the menu. Which was really easy. You have to have lamb, of course, with rice and gravy made from the lamb drippings, plus salad and charoset and matzoh, plus a vegetable, usually broccoli. And then there came dessert, which I ignore because I don’t make sweet stuff anymore. Plus, usually there’s one or two people who want to bring something, so I tell them I’m not planning to make dessert, and then there’s more than enough sugar there for those who choose to partake. So once I’d decided between dolmades from the deli or stuffed eggs flavored with lemon, green onions and olive oil (I went with the eggs), I was pretty much done.

And then I started looking for the prayers and ceremony that you use, called the Haggadah. And my dears, you would not believe how much crazy stuff there is out there purporting to be instructions on how to have a Seder, particularly when it’s adapted for Christians. And, you know, butchering the prayers is one thing, but when you start telling people that Charoset is peanut butter mixed with raisins, I have to draw the line. That’s just not natural! Everybody knows that charoset is apples, walnuts, cinnamon, and wine (maybe grape juice if you’re an abstainer). That’s it. It is not applesauce mixed with walnuts (though that’s a step in the right direction), and it is definitely not peanut butter mixed with raisins! Lord.

I am also excited because Sae and Mr. T will be coming, and bringing the entertainment in the form of their daughters Sweet Pea and Fleu. So we’ll have Fleur to ask the Four Questions (she’s a little nervous about this), and Sweet Pea to pass around and enjoy. I won’t have room for a highchair at the table, but I don’t think that will be a problem – we’ll have plenty of laps for her to choose from!

Speaking of whom, last weekend we had Sweet Pea’s first birthday party. I can’t believe it’s been a year since I drove down to Cincinnati after work through a driving rainstorm to meet and instantly fall in love with a tiny little blanket bundle of sweetness. It was a lovely party, and towards the end, when people were chatting in the living room, Sweet Pea surprised us all by taking her very first steps right there in front of everybody. Well, everyone except her father, who was off attending to important Party Business. We tried to encourage her to reenact the historic performance, but she was worn out from her earlier exertions and did not cooperate. But maybe on Saturday…

This is the story of how I played Spoons too hard, and ended up in the hospital.

Nope, not kidding.

You see, about a year and a half ago, I was diagnosed with high blood pressure. I started taking a low dose of an appropriate med, and made a few life changes, and that seemed to take care of it. However, apparently over the last few months, even as I’ve been making more life changes and seeing some measurable results (small amount of weight loss, some other improvements), it seems that my blood pressure has been creeping up again. The last time I was at the doctor, it was high, but not scary high, and I wasn’t having any other bad symptoms, plus there was the improvement in other areas, so we didn’t make any changes.

And then on Sunday, when I was playing Spoons, something happened. I’m still not really sure what it was, though the current medical theory is a sudden spike in blood pressure, combined with pulling a muscle in my chest wall. The result was me going lightheaded, and feeling like all the air had been knocked out of my lungs. The moment that this happened was when I was grabbing violently for a spoon (have I ever mentioned that I have this leetle competitive streak? also, I got my spoon), and laughing so hard that I was wheezing. In the blink of an eye I went from wheezing from laughter to wheezing and not laughing, sitting there in a cold sweat, my hands suddenly freezing, feeling like I was going to either a) vomit, b) pass out, c) fall out of my chair, or d) all of the above. So I sat very still in order to not do any of those things, and moved carefully, and fought off the faint feelings, and little by little my head began to clear, my heart stopped pounding quite so hard, and the warmth started to return to my hands.

No one at the table with me noticed that anything had happened.

I won the next two rounds of spoons while I was sitting there recovering.

When I finally lost a round, I felt well enough that I thought I could stand without falling over, so I went off to the bathroom. My cheeks were beet red. When I came out, I asked my host if there was any aspirin in the house. There wasn’t. I sat quietly until the game was over, and then drove myself home, debating with myself all the way whether I should really be driving myself to the nearest Emergency Room (or driving myself at all), and praying Hail Mary’s. In the end I told myself that home was next to the nearest Emergency Room (I live next to a hospital), so if I was feeling really bad by the time I got home, I would go there instead. But I was feeling marginally better, so I just went home, took a couple aspirin, got ready for bed, prayed “If I die before I wake…” and went to sleep.

I’m not going to pretend that any of the decisions I made during this were at all good decisions, or the medically recommended ones. In fact, they were pretty bloody stupid. The problem is that I hate being fussed over, and I cannot deal with other people’s emotions or panic when I am trying to handle my own. When I am in a lot of pain, physical or emotional, my instinct every time is to retreat and regroup until I know how to deal with it, and how to present it to others in such a way that they will not panic, or fuss, or make me have to deal with and comfort their negative emotions. If I had told the people at the table with me that I thought I was having a heart attack, they would have taken care of me, but there would have been an awful lot of me having to reassure people, and redirect their misguided attempts to help, and they probably would have called an ambulance, and it would have been huge and dramatic, and I absolutely could not face that right then. If I were a better, more humble person, maybe I could have just accepted all of that, and asked for the help I needed. But I wasn’t, and so I didn’t.

The next day, I felt terrible all day – light-headed, chest hurting. If I moved too fast, or walked too far, I felt worse. I walked some mail down to the mail room, and had to stop to sit down on my way back. An employee came up to talk about their career prospects while I was resting. I was laughing at the irony of the situation as I made polite responses, and waited for the light-headedness to fade. I did try to call my doctor to talk to him about what happened, but he wasn’t taking calls, and I didn’t have the energy to push it. I was terrified, but I didn’t tell anyone what had happened. I got a sub to teach for me at swing club because I was afraid that I couldn’t teach myself without passing out.

On Tuesday when I woke up, I felt much better. My energy was back, and my chest didn’t hurt. I almost decided not to call my doctor after all. However, right about 11:30, my chest started hurting again. So I waited until noon (that’s when my doctor takes calls), and called in. We discussed some of the test results from my recent visit (improvement, hurrah!), and then I told him about what had happened Sunday. He said that it was probably nothing serious, but that I needed to go to the nearest ER and get it checked out. I said that, since I work at a hospital, I was down the hall from the nearest ER, and did I need to go now, or could I wait until after work? He said I should go now. So I called my co-worker, and told her what I was doing, went to the bathroom, grabbed my purse, and went. I didn’t log out of my computer, I didn’t put away my work, and I didn’t grab my coat. I honestly thought they’d just run a couple of tests in the ER, and let me go home later that day.

It was possibly one of the most terrifying things I’ve ever done to walk into that ER, write my name down on the list, and sit down to wait to be called. I couldn’t stop thinking about my brother. It wasn’t until I’d actually sat down in the waiting room that it occurred to me that I should maybe let my family know that I was there. So I texted Mariah, Sae and Johnnycakes. Pretty soon a nurse came over and asked me why I was there. I said that I was having chest pain, the first time I’d said that out loud to anyone but my doctor. He put me in a wheelchair, and they took me back.

In the ER they ran a slew of tests, all of which seemed to show that my heart was fine. Except my blood pressure was really high. It had been really scary high when I came in, and started to slowly come down the longer I was there. That, combined with my family history, was enough to make them cautious, so they decided to admit me for observation overnight, and to run more tests (stress test, echocardiogram) in the morning. At that point I did not want to stay – I wanted them to tell me that everything was fine and I could go home now. But I wasn’t in control anymore. And that’s how I found myself Tuesday night in a hospital bed, wired up six ways to Sunday, trying to figure out exactly how long my cell phone battery would last, and how I was going to get clean underwear (answer: Dad brought them to me, along with toothbrush and deodorant, all lovingly packaged up by Mom & Indy).

Being in the hospital is such a surreal experience. It’s like you don’t have jurisdiction over your own body. People come in with requests for various body fluids, or reach down your shirt to attach wires, or come in the middle of the night to take your temperature or run tests. They’re all very polite and professional about it, but it’s still hard to take. I don’t know how many times I had to tell someone that no, there was no chance that I was pregnant, and that I knew this first because of exactly where I was in my monthly cycle, and second because I hadn’t seen any angels lately. One guy completely didn’t understand, and I then had to explain that seeing angels is how you get babies if you’re not having sex. The guy behind him got the joke, but I think he still didn’t.

It’s even more surreal being a patient in a hospital where people know you. Where you know way too much about the guy who’s currently attaching wires to your chest, and the girl who brings you your meal menu is a friend, and the ladies who come to draw your blood want to talk about uniform options. When the manager of Food Services heard I was there, he personally came up to lay all the services of his entire department at my feet, offering anything at all to help my stay be even the slightest bit more pleasant. He was so achingly earnest and sincerely distressed at my situation. I was just stressed enough that I had to restrain myself from asking if he would like to swear fealty to me now? Or maybe just some quail’s eggs for breakfast? Or his firstborn child on a platter? Except all I really wanted was to figure out what I had to say to get him to go away, because I wasn’t wearing a bra, and I don’t really know him all that well.

All of my tests came back negative, showing that my heart is doing just fine. My blood pressure is still high (and spiked alarmingly during the stress test), but the heart is fine. So they let me go home (I had to stop on the way out to get my coat from my office). They’ve changed up my meds a little, and I have an appointment to see my regular doctor next week. As soon as I can get the doctor who saw me at the hospital to sign my work release, I can go back to work.

I have been having the most fabulously lazy weekend. Last night I ended up introducing Johnnycakes to BBC’s Sherlock Holmes (there was also pizza involved), and then today I slept until I woke up naturally. I started to wake up at my normal-ish time, and then I thought, “No, it’s Saturday – I don’t have to do anything at all.” And I went back to sleep.

A little bit ago The Beautiful T called and invited me to come play board games with her and MDoS, and it looks like Indy and AnniPotts will be coming over as well. This is the first weekend in quite some time that I haven’t had plans. I haven’t seen them in far too long, so I’m very glad I was free to go.

Right now I’m cuddled up on the couch with my computer and a large mug of tea (caffeine!). I’m kind of thinking about maybe doing something slightly productive this afternoon. I’ve been reorganizing my sewing room, and I might work a bit on it since it isn’t so bitingly cold as it’s been. (My sewing room is unheated, so the weather tends to have more of an impact on my sewing plans than most seamstresses.) And then there’s always the laundry & weekly cleaning and all that stuff. But thinking about that makes me feel old and responsible. Sigh.

I still feel rather at loose ends, craftwise. Usually I have several projects stacked up, ready to go, with deadlines attached. I tend to like it that way. And I still have a list as long as my arm of things I want to do… someday. But for one reason or another – they’re not quite ready to start, or I don’t have just the right materials, or I just don’t want to right now – none of them are what I want to do. I’ve started swatching different eyelet patterns for the Fantine stockings. I still haven’t found the pattern I want to use yet, but I think I’ve narrowed it down to two. Hopefully that will be established soon and I can actually start. I hate this itchy, unsettled feeling.

There is not much family news. The Little Philospher (The Duchess’s daughter) has discovered that she has feet, and Sweet Pea has her first tooth. Tomorrow Rosie and AP are moving into what used to be The Girl Next Door’s town house, right next to Mariah. One of AnniPott’s first graders did a beautiful illustration for Catholic Schools’ Week, stating that the reason why she loves her teacher is because she is a zombie. In the illustration, AnniPotts is green, drooling, and grinning as she chases her student around the classroom. I think AnniPotts needs to frame this immortal work of art for posterity, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Sarah Whittle, coral stitch: You can use different thread thicknesses or change the angle of the knot to give different effects. Coral stitch can be used on straight or curved lines as well as being used as a textured filling stitch. When using as a filling stitch place the knots into spaces between the knots of the previous row .